St John the
Evangelist

Commemorated May 8

The
"Divine Dozen" who served Jesus Christ as his apostles
comprised a band of spiritual giants whose comparison to one
another invites scarcely more than an embarrassment. But the
sentimental favourite seems to be St. John the Evangelist
and Theologian, the apostle who looked into the dying eyes
of our crucified Lord on that dark day at Calvary and
received the Messiah's last request. An agonised John heard
the final words from the Cross, entrusting to him the care
of the Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, who was uppermost in
the thoughts of her Son in his last moments of earthly life
(John 19.26).

Born in Bethesda of Galilee, the son of Zebedee, John
shared his apostolic mission with his brother the Apostle
James, who died for Christ in Jerusalem. His mother's name
was Salome, but he is affectionately referred to as having
three mothers, the other two being Mary the Mother of Jesus
and the symbolic Thunder (Boanerges). The latter applied to
him by the Saviour, as the son of Thunder, because he was
rebuked for asking Christ to send down "fire from Heaven to
punish the citizens of Samaria that refused to admit him
because he was going to Jerusalem" (Luke 9.58-56). He was in
close personal contact with Jesus to the end, despite his
extensive travels as an evangelist. A dedicated apostle,
John was chosen by Jesus Christ to accompany Him on the
ascent of Mt. Tabor, the scene of the historic
Transfiguration, and where Jesus was proclaimed by God to be
"his beloved Son." The personal ties with Jesus and his
Mother were shared by Salome, John's mother, whose love for
the Saviour earned her a place among the saints and whose
feast day is celebrated on August 8, as one of the seven
myrrh-bearing women who anointed the sacred body of Christ,
after his descent from the Cross.

John remained close to the Mother of the Saviour
throughout her lifetime and was at her side when she
breathed her last on August 15, officiating at her burial in
the Garden of Gethsemane, a spot made sacred by her Son
years before. He was among the other disciples who
discovered the empty tomb of Mary, who forty days after her
death had been assumed into Heaven.

With his promise to Jesus for his Mother's care
fulfilled, St. John now turned his full attention to
carrying the message of Jesus Christ to the spiritually
darkened areas of the then known world, preaching throughout
Asia Minor with a passion that won converts who formed a
solid base for the New Faith. Unlike the other eleven
apostles, all of whom were martyred in the name of Jesus
Christ, John lived to the ripe age of 105, escaping the fate
of his brother evangelists.

This remarkable durability provided for one of the
longest services on record in the cause of Christ, a service
which carried over into the second century which establishes
him as a record holder in conversions to Christianity. Some
estimates have it that he was personally responsible for
winning over some 400,000 pagans to Christianity, a
staggering figure considering that his audiences could never
have been at best a few hundred and most of the time a lot
less. Not even his uncle, St. Prophoros, who wrote about his
nephew's travels, could have envisioned such a protracted
mission for the Messiah.

John withdrew from the gruelling pace of preaching in
favour of the solitude of the beautiful island of Patmos in
the Aegean Sea. There he refreshed his mind and body and
found the tranquility in which it became possible to write
that part of the holy Scriptures known as the Revelation, a
profound and prophetic book of the New Testament. This holy
work was done at the express bidding of God, who smote a
huge cleft in a rock formation of a cave, still visible
today, and commanded John to write this revealing segment of
the Bible. On the spot where lightning struck the cave the
Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople maintains to this
day a sacred shrine which has beckoned countless religious
pilgrims to the island of Patmos.

After leaving Patmos, John turned up at Ephesos, where,
in the course of writing the three epistles contained in the
New Testament, he is said to have caused, through means of a
prayer vigil, the destruction of a pagan temple dedicated to
Artemis which is now the site of a beautiful cathedral. A
true man of God, John is one of the most beloved figures of
Christianity.